


Trespass

by odoridango



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Canon - Manga, Canon Compliant, F/F, Sasha POV, Trainee Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-30
Updated: 2014-12-30
Packaged: 2018-03-04 10:38:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3064694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/odoridango/pseuds/odoridango
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Why do we have to change for those outsiders, Sasha thinks, thinks and watches Mikasa's nightmares, but also her strength.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Trespass

Sasha likes to think she knows better now, remembers the dry-throated, chest-throbbing feeling of betrayal sitting in her chest, the constant, gnawing pains of her stomach, the feeble hate and stubbornness that tripped off her tongue. _Why do we have to change for those outsiders_ , she said, _why do we have to starve for them, why do we have to make room for them._ They should eke out their lives like anyone else, like the village did, hunting the game carefully in the woods, following the deer, the rabbits, the squirrels, with an arrow nocked into their bow.

Mikasa, Armin and Eren are skinny. Even after weeks and months of hard, military training, Armin and Eren’s waists are rail-thin, and their appetites small. Mikasa too, though she seems to fare better than her friends, roped in muscle and wiry strength. The first time they had changed in the bunks, Sasha could see her ribs, and was shocked to see how pale she was underneath all the grime and filth that came with the labor of reclaiming land.

“Shiganshina,” people had said, and Sasha hid her country accent, hearing the folks from the inner cities talking about the boonies, talking about uncivilized people, and she kept her nose down because she’d had enough of shame, of humiliation, about having her way of life snatched away right underneath her nose. She heard Eren talking in the mess hall, talking big, thought that people like him were the ones to drive the food away, loudmouth outsiders who didn’t lift a finger and just flapped their lips, complaining, always complaining, but Mikasa was quiet about it, at least until curfew arrived and the nightmares came.

She’d been woken more than once by the quiet but frantic rapping at the door of the girls’ cabin, Armin and Eren huddled cold and quiet, peering in and searching for Mikasa with their eyes. They seemed to have a sixth sense for these things, and even though Mikasa was pretty quiet she cried loudly, let Armin cup her hands and Eren stroke the hair she’d cut because he’d said so.

“Why do you listen to him?” Sasha once asked irritably. Mikasa didn’t seem like them, outsider riffraff, though Armin wasn’t much like them either, wary and timid and well-used to the punishing blow of a fist. He was like a scared animal sometimes, knowing the best nooks and crannies to hide in for solitary security, at least until Eren found him and scooted in too, Mikasa joining the pile when she wandered by. For a while, the three of them were found in the most unlikely places, curled up in miniscule tree hollows, folded neatly into the space under the spare shelves of the linen closets, tucked into the shadows under the double bunks in the barracks. Small spaces, always, where they were pressed up against one another.

“He’s family,” Mikasa said simply, “I promised to watch him.” Her gaze was determined, flinty, and she looked Sasha in the eye and didn’t smile. A promising look, Sasha thought, even as the chills darted up her spine.

She could understand that a little. Her mother showing her, when she was young, how to best clean the animals her father hunted, to check the entrails for disease, to scrape and skin to save furs for winter. And when her mother was gone, her father, teaching her to fletch and arrow, how to aim and shoot, hold steady on horseback. Traditions, Sasha knew, were hard to shake off, and the promises in them even more difficult to break.

Mikasa watches her during the maneuver gear exercises sometimes, and it makes her nervous, makes her feel like the rabbits she used to hunt.

“What?!” she blurts anxiously, fidgeting.

“You’re very steady,” Mikasa says, takes one of her hands and opens the palm, strokes a warm finger over the cut that reopened when she gripped a handle a little too tightly. “But flexible.” Peering at her over the edge of a red scarf, Mikasa’s eyes crinkle minutely in the corners.

She’s smiling.

“You’re fun to watch,” she says.

So sometimes, now, they swing the obstacles together, and Mikasa doesn’t mind if Sasha climbs down from her bunk and sits with her a little bit before Armin and Eren get there. It’s a little strange, but after a while she ends up wrapped with them too, a huge ball of tangled limbs.

One morning she wakes up and finds Mikasa’s blinking back at her sleepily, spitting out a couple strands of misplaced blond hair. Sasha tries to muffle her giggles, but Mikasa frowns a little, this cute pout of the lips, and reaches out a finger to poke her nose.

“Be quiet,” she says simply, pushes Sasha’s nose again.

Heat, flushing her cheeks, and Sasha’s giggles stop abruptly. Mikasa blinks again, still tired, offers a slow, sleepy smile. Her thumb strokes the slash of red highlighting Sasha’s cheekbones, a little cool against the blush, and Sasha bites her lip, feeling oddly anxious and excited. Mikasa pats her cheek.

“Good,” she says, yawns, and closes her eyes.

Outsiders, Sasha thinks, eyes wide and lips pressed together, tracing the memory of Mikasa’s fingers shakily. Her body is warm. Outsiders, coming in and barging where they’re not wanted. Changing things.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Because there are some interesting parallels between Mikasa and Sasha regarding family, tradition, and strength. Also, I think Sasha's backstory places her at a very interesting point of tension with the Shiganshina trio, but I've never seen it talked about. sorry i am just a mess of Shiganshina trio feels >.> ALSO SASHAMIKA to close out the year because why not.


End file.
